I am following the topic about Fascism in Latin America (including French Canada) with this month essay about the Fascism between Italians, who were resident in these nations from the 1920s to WW2. The main orgabnization was the "FASCI ALL' ESTERO".
It is noteworthy to pinpoint that there it is little documentation on the origin of the Fasci. The bibliography consists of a few superficial works compiled by their organizers. See G. Bastianini, Gli Italiani all'estero (Milan 1939); C. Di Marzio, Il fascismo all'estero (Milan 1923); idem, ‘Fascisti all'estero’ in Civiltà Fascista (Turin 1928); P. Parini, ‘I Fasci italiani all'Estero’ in Il Decennale (Florence 1929), 406– 30; idem, Gli Italiani nel mondo (Milan 1935). There are only two recent scholarly works on the Fasci: E. Santarelli, ‘I Fasci italiani all'estero’ in Ricerche sul Fascismo (Urbino 1971), 123–66; E. Gentile, ‘La Politica Estera del Partito Fascista’, Storia Contemporanea, 25 (December 1995), 897–956.
Fasci Italiani all' Estero (Italian fascists in the world)
After the 1922 March on Roma, the Mussolini's fascist regime sought to exert social control over Italian communities abroad. This required the creation of an umbrella organization, the "Fasci di Italiani all’estero", within which the groups of fascists abroad that had emerged spontaneously between 1920 and 1921 could be brought together. The mission of the Fasci abroad was to create a feeling of community among Italian emigrants within the framework of Italy’s higher interests. They had their press organ: «Il Legionario», written in Italian language and published in Roma.
So, in the autumn of 1922, a loyal collaborator of Mussolini, Ottavio Dinale, agreed to represent the National Fascist Party (PNF) on a trip to South America. His goal was to find an outlet for Italian labor through the colonization of regions of Argentina, thus preventing uncontrolled emigration. Among other mandates, Dinale was responsible for promoting the Fascist Party and—possibly—founding local fascist groups. The goal was to organize fascism beyond Italy, and in this direction, in February 1923 the Grand Council decreed the establishment of a central office for the Fasci abroad within the secretariat of the PNF, tasked with "disciplining and directing" the fascist movement worldwide.
As written last month, Giuseppe Bastianini (one of the founders of Fascism) in late 1922 was appointed in Roma by Mussolini as head of the "Fasci Italiani all'Estero", a movement aimed at co-ordinating the activities of Italian fascists not currently living in Italy. He called on members to seek to diffuse proper Italian fascist ideals wherever they were living. This group soon gained a considerable following amongst Italian expatriates in the mid-1920s, mainly in South America. Indeed, in 1925 he submitted a report to the Fascist Grand Council claiming to have groups in 40 countries worldwide, most of them in Latin America. On 30-31 October 1925 the "Fasci all'estero" held its first congress in Rome. The next year Bastianini resigned in order to work as a diplomat.
In 1928, Mussolini ordered the organization of Italian youth programs abroad and began to pay particular attention to Italian youth programs. There was a problem of how to “fascistizzare” Italian society and the control of Italian youth was a fundamental tactic. The creation of the Opera Nazionale Balilla (National Balilla Opera) in Argentina was fundamental for the fascist government to attract Italian youth.
In 1937, “Il Legionario”, the official organ of the Italian Fasci abroad, spoke of Mussolini's network in the world which apparently counted 481 Fasci, 244 after-work sections, 171 Houses of Italy, 200 schools, both subsidized and government-run; furthermore, the regime's youth organizations abroad had 65,000 members. Some of these young members were offered to come back to Italy and know their roots for free.
Italians of the "Fasci all' Estero" from southern Argentina donating a commemorative tribute to the "Monumento della Patria" in Roma's Vittoriale, in the late 1930s.
In early 1940 there were Fasci in all the Latin America countries (including Quebec-Canada, that had nearly one hundred members in 1939).
Indeed a huge amount of the activity of these Fasci was done in South America, mainly in Argentina and Brazil, the countries with the biggest Italian communities:
ARGENTINA
While there was never a completely fascist regime in Argentina, the influence of Italian policies and politics in Argentina was unique. There were Argentine politicians that supported Mussolini’s government and so, “like the Argentine state, Argentine society Remained extremely receptive to Fascism between the years of 1919 and 1945. Finchelstein”. The fundamental reason for Italian interests towards Argentina was a result of the huge wave of Italian immigrants in Argentina, the most significant group in the whole of Argentina. Through I Fasci Italiani all’Estero (Italian Fascists Abroad), the different programs for Italian youth and adults, as well as the education reform for Italian schools abroad, Mussolini obtained the support of many Italian immigrants in Argentina.
In 1933, there was the first fascist summer camp in Argentina and throughout South America. In the months of January and February, a hundred children of Italian origins participated in the camp. In 1935 there were 3 operating camps throughout Argentina and eventually also developed in Uruguay and Brazil. While the creation of a summer camp may not seem extraordinary, the influence of the summer camp had the potential to change the mentality of youth, towards loyalty to fascism, the homeland, and Benito Mussolini.
In 1930, Vittorio Valdini , the main financier of the operation and the leader of the fascists in Argentina, founded a new fascist newspaper, Il Mattino d’Italia, based in Buenos Aires. As fascism grew, its propaganda also grew.
Above all , Il Mattino d’Italia was a fundamental tool of fascist propaganda. According to the historian Bertagna, the initial edition of Il Mattino d’Italia consisted of around 10,000 copies. During the conflict in Ethiopia between 1935 and 1936, the newspaper reached approximately 40,000 copies
Fascism was embraced by many Italians living outside Italy. Those who were pro-Mussolini did not characterize themselves ideologically; rather, their appreciation of Il Duce was framed within a kind of nostalgic nationalism that identified Mussolini as a redeemer of the homeland. Among those who fought in Ethiopia was a group of Italian volunteers from abroad who enlisted in the Parini Legion of Italian Fascisms of the East.
In Rome on August 6, 1935, less than a month before the start of operations to conquer Ethiopia, a military communiqué was issued, which, among other things, stated: "The formation of a sixth Blackshirt Division is hereby established, made up of Italian volunteers residing abroad and with battalions composed of amputees, veterans, and former arditi volunteers of the Great War. This division will be called Tevere (Tiber) and will be commanded by General Boscardi." The division's units were the 219th Italian Legion; the 220th Italian Legion; the 221st Italian Legion; and the 321st Italian Legion. With its four legionaries units, the 6th "Tevere" Division had 456 officers and 14,111 other ranks. The division's motto was "Molti nemici, molto onore" (Many enemies, so much more honor).
Italians residing in Argentina were also asked to participate as volunteers in the East African campaign. This Italian imperialist project convulsed the Italian community in Argentina like no other. Men who had nothing to do with fascism joined Mussolini's initiative, while others demonstrated their total rejection. The Italian-Argentine Community recruited a contingent of volunteers to participate in the Ethiopian campaign, composed of more than 700 men who departed in four successive waves. Argentina's case was not unique; the number of volunteers was larger in Brazil (around 1000) with a few from Uruguay (100), and even larger in French Africa.
In September 1936 these legionary volunteers from Latin America returned to Italy and paraded in Rome (https://patrimonio.archivioluce.com/luce-web/detail/IL3000020395/12/la-legione-fasci-italiani-all-estero-ritorno-dall-africa-orientale-sfila-via-nazionale-acclamata-dalla-folla-2.html?startPage=0) in a successful reunion with Mussolini.
Furthermore, from 1919 to 1925, approximately 372,000 Italians emigrated to Argentina. However, in 1926 the numbers began to decrease drastically and between 1926 and 1940 only 80.300 Italians immigrated. But even with the decrease the Italians & their descendants were approximately half of the Argentina population in 1940. And the fascist agenda in Argentina continued with the formation of programs such as the "Dopolavoro", the "Patronato del Lavoro", "Balilla (Gioventù Italiana Littorio nell’Estero)" and the control of some Italian schools mainly in the capital region.
In this year there were more than 4000 active members of the Fascio all' Estero in Buenos Aires: after WW2 (when Fascism was outlawed) they actively supported the rise of "Peronism" in Argentina.
Argentina "Fasci all' Estero" (volunteers in Mussolini's Ethiopia conquest) parading in front of Mussolini in October 1936, when back in Roma.
BRAZIL
The first "Fascio" of Brazil, named after Filippo Corridoni, emerged in the city of São Paulo in March 1923 on the initiative of Emídio Rochetti, who was implicated in the murder of the Communist Party secretary of Macerata in Italy in 1921. Two months later, the "Pietro Poli" Fascio opened in Rio de Janeiro, and a year later, PNF (National Fascist Party) chapters were created in other centers of the country, also responding to the pressure exerted by Ottavio Dinale, who had been sent to Latin America for this purpose in 1923. In quantitative terms, the growth of such structures is, at first glance, significant.
At the end of 1924, Mussolini himself provided, in a speech to the Senate, the number of forty units in Brazil (equivalent to a little less than a tenth of the total of Fasci abroad, an indication that, however, does not match those of other sources from the same period. In September 1927, their number rose to 52 and in 1934, according to openly partisan estimates, to 82, of which 35 were in the state of São Paulo, where more than 70% of the Italian population resided. Even leaving aside the accuracy of such indications, the sense of an extraordinary diffusion of Party structures weakens if we handle the partial and fragmentary data on registered members. In Rio de Janeiro, the number rose from 130 in 1924 to 1,000 in 1928 and to 1,100 in 1932; In Minas Gerais there were 700 on this last date, a year in which there were a hundred of them in Bahia; in São Paulo, they increased from 400 in 1924 to 1,745 in 1928 and to approximately 2,000 shortly after the mid-1930s.
Considering that the states of São Paulo, Minas Gerais, and Rio de Janeiro hosted more than 80% of Italians, it is no exaggeration to state that, until the mid-1930s, the total number of registered Italians in Brazil never exceeded 5,000-6,000, a laughable number compared to the number of peninsular residents, which was 558,000 in the 1920 census, 435,000 according to reliable estimates in 1930, and 325,000 in the 1940 census. This inconsistency is also documented in the records seized from the São Paulo Fascio by Brazilian police in the early 1940s, which demonstrates that in 18 years of life, the total number of all affiliations of fascist Italians never exceeded 18,000, a percentage relatively insignificant compared to the adult Italian males residing in the city.
The proliferation of PNF sections in Brazil must, therefore, be related not so much to an effective capacity for rooting among immigrants, but rather to their territorial dispersion over a very broad area, which encouraged the establishment of Party structures – under the impetus of the consular corps or the ethnic elite – in every location where there was even a minimal Italian presence.
On the cultural front, there was a weak effort to open scholastic courses and a stronger one to promote theatrical performances, staged by amateur immigrant companies, sometimes during afternoons or evenings of dancing, in complete harmony with what had been a common practice in previous decades of the ethnic labor movement, especially of anarchist orientation. Ultimately, the organization of free time ended up representing one of the main concerns of the Fasci, who created musical bands, opened dance and singing courses, organized Sunday outings, a perfect copy of the popular trains in Italy, and promoted sports events, sometimes having their own facilities for these latter activities. The custom of creating summer camps was also widespread, and the insistence on such operations was motivated both by the importance of instilling Italian identity in the hearts of the children of immigrants born in Brazil—and therefore Brazilians to all intents and purposes, according to local legislation based on the principle of ius soli—or because of the awareness of the high propaganda value of these initiatives in the political sphere. The colonies and primary schools ended up being centers of indoctrination and proselytism.
The spread of the colonies was also supported by the Opera Nazionale Dopolavoro (OND) with such energy that it even placed Brazil at the top of the list of Latin American countries for these specific initiatives. In this sense, the ONDs ended up competing with the Fasci throughout the 1930s.
The overlapping of functions was objectively ineliminable, given that the directives given by the regime to the ONDs in the world were to provide physical and sports education for Italian workers, the institution of professional training courses, the organization of free time, patriotic propaganda, economic and moral assistance—that is, in a word, the task of "absorbing every manifestation of the life of our emigrant masses."
Thus, even working in harmony with the PNF sections, of which they were partially projections and instruments in the eyes of the immigrants, the ONDs took over their space, especially thanks to the favor they found, not so much in terms of the multiplication of branches (19 throughout Brazil at the end of the 1930s) as in terms of registered members: in the city of São Paulo there were 1,500 in 1931, the year of their opening, 5,437 in 1934, and 7,100 in 1937 (while the Fascio members remained only a bit increased in the late 1930s).
In other words: the sport and social organizations of the Italian government were more followed than the Fascism politics of the Fascio all' Estero by the Italians and their descendants in Brazil.
Only with the rupture of diplomatic relations in January 1942 and even more so with the declaration of war in August of the same year would the definitive dissolution of Fasci be achieved, as well as the closure of Italian schools, associations and newspapers.
1936 photo of "Fasci all'Estero" from Brazil, parading in Roma's Vittoriale
